


Haven

by ScribeofArda



Series: lay down my heavy load [3]
Category: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)
Genre: (It's a trick question), Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Because it's me so you know there's gonna be angst, Because you know spies gonna gossip, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, POV Outsider, POV new agent trying to figure out for the life of her what is going on at UNCLE, Some semblance of a plot but mostly, The ongoing problem of working out who you should really be scared of at UNCLE, coffee shop AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-26
Updated: 2021-02-26
Packaged: 2021-03-17 15:40:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29719422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScribeofArda/pseuds/ScribeofArda
Summary: There are three rules to surviving at UNCLE.One: Waverly knows. Whatever secret you think you can keep from him, whatever little thing you think isn’t worth his time, he already knows. Two: you might think that out of Illya Kuryakin and Gaby Teller, out of all the stories you must have heard of them, that Illya is the one you need to be careful of. You would be wrong.Three: Solo's coffee shop is ours. Disrupt it, and you will forfeit your place here. Harm him in any way, and there's no point even trying to run.
Relationships: Illya Kuryakin/Napoleon Solo
Series: lay down my heavy load [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1918252
Comments: 21
Kudos: 66





	Haven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oof. I am genuinely sorry it has taken me so long to get this up. I know I promised the next story in this series a couple weeks after Gingerbread finished, but I've been hella busy with work (horses aren't aware there's a second lockdown on) and I haven't managed to work on this story at all since the end of Gingerbread was published. It's not actually finished, either- every other story you have read was written in its entirety before I began publishing it, but this one is still very much a WIP, so there will be an even more haphazard publishing schedule than previously, but I'm hoping that putting up the first chapter now will give me a bit of a boost towards finishing it.
> 
> This story has even less semblance of a plot than the previous one, but it is set after the conclusion of Gingerbread, so Markos and Julia will feature! For anyone who hasn't read the previous two stories in this series, you might want to start there, because I don't think this will make much sense without that context.
> 
> I also have finished the fantasy oneshot I have mentioned, which is also published now because I might as well make use of this burst of productivity whilst it lasts- you can find it [here!](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29719368).
> 
> Again, I am sorry this has taken so long, and will be a very haphazard publishing schedule.

She knows that they’ve really fucked up when UNCLE arrives.

The helicopter slowly descends, UNCLE’s logo emblazoned on the side. Lian tries to shield her face from the dust blown up, twisting away on the rickety crate she is sat on. The smoke from the still smouldering wreckage is blown their way, and her eyes would start watering if they hadn’t been stinging fiercely ever since the bomb went off and half their evidence went up in proverbial and literal flames.

Lian and the rest of her team watch as the helicopter touches down and the rotors slowly come to a stop. One of the other Interpol agents groans, and lets their head fall back against the crate they’re sitting up against. It makes an audible noise, and Lian winces in sympathy. “Great,” they mutter. “They’re here to stay. We’ve _really_ fucked up.”

“Ever met any UNCLE agents?” Lian asks.

The agent hums. “Yeah, a while back I worked on a case with a couple of them. They’re good. They’re really good.” They huff a bitter laugh. “If they weren’t here because we fucked up their operation, I would actually be pretty excited. You can learn a lot from them.”

Lian nods. She hasn’t been at Interpol long enough to meet UNCLE agents personally, but she has heard enough already. UNCLE takes all the missions too complicated, too political or just too insane for other agencies to take. They operate beyond the parameters of individual nations, beyond politics or petty disputes that restrict everyone else from doing what needs to be done. It is the ideal that every agent seems to aspire to, and Lian is almost certain that it is too good to be true.

The door of the helicopter slides open. Two people jump down first, in combat fatigues and with rifles held steady at their shoulders. They take up positions at the front and rear of the bird, scanning the surrounding area, and then two more people step out.

A woman is the first one on the ground. She is dressed in combat clothes, greys and browns, a holster at her thigh and a duffel bag over one shoulder. Her hair is scraped back away from her face, and her ponytail whips around and nearly hits her in the cheek as she turns to talk to the man behind her.

Lian can’t help the hitch in her breath when she sees him. Tall, blonde, kitted out with enough firepower to put everyone else to shame. He glances around the impromptu camp they’ve set up whilst they regain their breath and try to figure their way out of this mess, and when he answers the woman’s question, he’s close enough that Lian can pick out the sound of Russian.

She knows exactly who these two are. And she knows that if they sent Kuryakin and Teller all the way out here, then they have really, truly fucked up.

“Oh, shit,” the agent next to her breathes. “Here we go.”

Teller strides across the clearing towards their group, Kuryakin following close behind. Her face is set in stone as she stops in the middle of them, arms crossed over her chest. “So,” she says. “What the fuck happened here?”

All eyes turn to Gibson.

Kuryakin steps forwards, his hands resting on the butt of his rifle where it hangs from the webbing. “With me,” he says to Gibson, his voice flat. “Now.”

Lian can already hear Gibson begin his protestations that this wasn’t his fault as he gets up and follows Kuryakin a ways away. Teller waits until they’re out of direct earshot, and then sets her bag down. “Right,” she says, and then sits right down in the dirt.

Lian blinks in surprise. Teller doesn’t seem to notice as she digs around in her bag. “Here,” she says. A chocolate bar lands squarely in Lian’s lap. “Eat,” Teller says to them. “You all look like you need it.”

The agent next to her snorts. “If you have a shower packed away in there, that might be more helpful. But thanks.”

Teller laughs at that, and a little of the mystique surrounding her melts away before Lian’s eyes. “You do all look a bit smoked,” she says. “None of you are hurt? There was no mention of casualties in the briefing.”

Lian flexes her hands a little in her lap. The skin of her palms is pink and feeling raw from where she had instinctively grabbed the door handle, but she had let go before any real damage was done. “We’re good,” another agent says. “Well, physically, we’re all fine. Everything else is…” He sighs, leaning back on his hands. “Fucked.”

“Pretty much,” Teller replies around a mouthful of chocolate. She glances at the smoking compound. “What was recovered?”

“Some evidence, but not enough. And Hansen is long gone. We won’t find him again.”

Teller just hums. “That remains to be seen. Now, who wants to fill in the blanks on how Interpol stumbled into a year-long UNCLE operation and turned it on its head within, oh, about two days?” She smiles sharply at them. “The briefings only say so much.”

Lian glances past her to where Gibson is still talking to Kuryakin, face slowly turning red and arms waving about in the air as he tries to exonerate himself, most likely. Kuryakin’s face is set in stone, and he stands unmoving even as Gibson nearly hits him in the chest with one of his gestures. She says nothing as someone else reluctantly begins to talk.

The rest of the agents waste minutes talking in circles around the botched mission. Lian knows she should keep her mouth shut. She’s only been a field agent for less than a year. She should leave this all to the people who know what they are doing.

If she was with people who knew what they were doing, if their team was led by someone who knows what they are doing, then they wouldn’t be in this mess, she thinks viciously.

“It was Gibson’s fault,” she says abruptly.

The agent talking falls silent, and they turn as one to stare at her, shocked. “ _Lian_ ,” one of them hisses, making a cutting gesture at her. “Leave it.”

“No, I’m not going to just throw all of us under the bus,” Lian snaps. “Gibson is our team leader. He is the one who overextended us. We didn’t have nearly enough people for this, let alone any other resources, and he knew it. We knew that he knew it. And he still pushed us here anyway, because he was so damn set on getting Hansen.” She looks around at the rest of them. “You all know this. We’ve seen it coming for _weeks_.”

“It’s not…” one of the other agents trails off, and ducks her head. “Yeah. What she said.”

When Lian dares to look at her, Teller is studying her intently. “Interesting,” she says. She shifts to face Lian directly. “Tell me more.”

Lian does. She doesn’t think she could stop, even if she wanted to. Teller is, quite frankly, awe-inspiring.

She has heard the stories. She heard them from the moment she first stepped into Interpol with no idea of how any of it actually worked. She heard about UNCLE almost immediately, of course. It was part of the introductory briefings on the greater world of international intelligence, neatly typed out in plain folders that she tried to memorise each evening.

Kuryakin and Teller, those stories she picked up elsewhere. Sometimes it felt like they just bled from the walls of the building, no obvious source to the whispers of mission after mission completed, insane risks taken and the right thing done each time, two agents walking out of the tangles of politics and espionage untouched by so many grabbing hands reaching for them, over and over again.

Her words eventually dry up. The others have interjected at points, adding details, but Lian has somehow done most of the talking. Teller has remained quiet throughout, only nodding, or occasionally taking down notes in a little notebook that appeared from a pocket somewhere. “Well,” she says when Lian says nothing else for a long minute. “I will make it clear in my report where the fault lies for all this…mess. And what should be done about it.” She gets to her feet, glancing over her shoulder and pulling a face. “Now, I should fetch my partner before he murders someone and this all gets even messier, and then I think we are heading out.”

Lian glances over to where they are. Kuryakin is still stone-faced, staring at Gibson as he continues to rant. One of his fingers is rhythmically tapping against his rifle, over and over again. He doesn’t look like he’s about to snap and shoot Gibson in the foot, but then again, Lian has heard the stories. She wouldn’t be surprised.

“I thought you were here to clean up our mess?” one of the agents asks.

Teller laughs. “Oh, sorry, no. We’re after Hansen. There are others coming behind us to help with all this.” She waves one hand at the smoking compound. “We’ll lend aid for clean-up until your own people get here, but my partner and I aren’t staying.”

“He’s long gone,” one of the agents says morosely. “Hansen. Went to ground the moment he knew we were coming.”

Teller just shrugs, and looks back at her partner again. “We’ve dug out worse rats than this one. We’ll find him.”

She sounds so certain. Lian thinks she might actually believe her.

Gaby turns away, and then pauses. “Oh,” she says to herself. She pulls something out of her pocket, scribbles something down on it, and then holds it out to Lian. “In case you need it.”

Lian glances down at it. It’s a business card, _Agent G. Teller_ embossed in silver and a number underneath. UNCLE’s logo is small in one corner. She flips it over to see a scrawl of untidy writing across the back.

_If you get tired of Interpol._

By the time Lian looks up, Teller is already walking away. Kuryakin breaks off from Gibson and falls into step beside her. They look so calm, so assured, and Lian thinks she might believe every story she has ever heard about them.

She pockets the card, and schools her face as Gibson storms back to them. She can think about that later. For now, there’s work to do.

0-o-0-o-0

The card burns a hole in her pocket for months, until one evening, after yet another day of political bullshit halting any objective dead on its feet, she pulls it out and calls that number. Surprisingly, Teller remembers her.

Four months later and Lian is walking into the halls of UNCLE for the first time.

It’s a whirlwind. She learns almost immediately that the philosophy that people talk about, the one she was almost convinced couldn’t possibly be true after a couple years in Interpol, is actually real. The briefings she is given are massive and wide-ranging, covering all sorts of international disputes that she hadn’t had any idea of at Interpol, and are obviously only the very beginning of what UNCLE is involved in.

Nearly every briefing she has- and there are _so many_ , as the new baby of the junior field agents she spends weeks just being briefed- there is the same undercurrent. The same type of decisions laid out for her in neat 12-point font, and within weeks, Lian begins to trust it when they explain to her again that UNCLE tries to operate above the bureaucracy that stymies national agencies, that they really do take the missions and problems that threaten global peace.

“We do want to try and do what is right,” a senior agent, Aja, tells her. “And everyone can argue all day long as to what that is precisely, just wait until you see Illya find one of his moral sticking points and yell at Gabs about it, but ultimately, we’re all here for the same reason.” She looks over at Lian. “We want to protect people. Help people. Yes?”

Lian nods. “I just…I only spent a couple years with Interpol, but the bureaucracy there, the constant attempts to get one over on another country… _how_?”

Aja’s expression softens slightly. “Tell you what, I’ll get you the backlogs of Kuryakin and Teller’s mission reports. Read those. Then you might see what I mean.”

Lian does. It’s quite frankly terrifying, what they’re able to do.

She goes all the way back to their first mission, an Italian crime family and weapons of mass destruction, an UNCLE sleeper agent and an SVR agent only just met who manage to prevent the resurgence of the nuclear arms race. It’s insane, and awe-inspiring, and somehow even more crazy than the stories she had heard whispered from the walls.

She doesn’t see Kuryakin and Teller themselves much. Teller had greeted her as head field agent, Kuryakin appearing briefly and saying a few words Lian can’t remember anymore, and then they had disappeared again. She heard recently that they were in Taiwan, carrying out some insane mission that nobody else wanted to take, but she isn’t sure.

They reappear about a month after Lian has started at UNCLE. She is at her desk in the field agents’ open office, half-watching some other agents brainstorming a plan on the large whiteboard up on one wall as she tries to pull together a preliminary action plan for an upcoming mission that she is shadowing, when the lift opens.

The room slowly falls silent. Teller appears first, duffel bag slung over one shoulder. She looks exhausted, her hair frazzled and half-falling out of a haphazard ponytail. Even from a distance, Lian can see the dark bags under her eyes as she glances around the room. Kuryakin looks little better. She’s pretty sure that’s dried blood streaked down one cheek, and one of his hands looks purple with bruises as he pulls out his phone.

“Cowboy will have lunch ready whenever we want it,” he says to Teller, and Lian definitely heard that right but still can’t quite work out what that means. “Debrief, then downstairs?”

“He better have some brownies,” Teller replies as she takes a folder from an agent. “I’m not in the mood for his excuses about chocolate shortages.”

Lian watches as Kuryakin actually rolls his eyes. “I’ll text him.”

“You do that.” Teller turns to the rest of the room. “Alright, what have we missed whilst chasing yet another madman through a jungle?”

The room erupts into somewhat organised chaos. After a few minutes, Kuryakin waves a few of the senior field agents away with him into a corner, and Lian watches as what appears to be an intense discussion starts. Someone brings out a laptop and then they’re crowding around a bench, voices too low for her to pick anything out.

Teller is flitting from person to person, files being handed over or taken from her. There’s a grin on her face even as the dark circles under her eyes become more prominent in the bright overhead lights. It’s obvious even to Lian that this is a well-oiled machine, if a little messy in places.

Eventually, the two of them disappear for a debriefing. Lian can hear them bickering all the way down the hall, and the chaos in the bullpen slowly subsides.

After a few minutes, Aja groans at her desk. “Right, who wants some coffee?”

Any semblance of peace abruptly vanishes.

Aja turns to her when the rush of orders eventually dies down. “Lian? Coffee?”

“Isn’t there a coffee machine in the break room?” Lian asks. She glances around at all the other agents, who have thinly-veiled looks of anticipation as they wait for Aja to leave. “Pretty decent coffee.”

“Has nobody taken the new one down to Solo’s?” someone asks. “Oh my god, you need to go with Aja to pick up the coffees. Go on, don’t worry about that proposal thing. You’ve got time.”

Somehow, Lian finds herself in the lift with Aja. “I’m sorry, what are we doing?” she asks. “Why is everyone so enthused about some coffee?”

Aja huffs a laugh, and glances over at Lian. “There’s a lot of secrets to this place, Lian. You’ll learn most of them eventually. This is probably one of the worst-kept ones we have, and it was about time someone showed you.”

She leads her out of the lift and through the building to a side door. Aja jimmies it open, and then props it open with a brick conveniently lying on the ground right next to the door. A coffee shop is just across the street, the sign above the door swinging gently in the brisk breeze that has Lian tucking her chin into the collar of her coat.

It looks…warm. Inviting. She can see armchairs and sofas through the large windows, shelves of books lining one wall. Someone pushes the door open and walks out past them, and the smell of roasted coffee and something baking makes Lian’s mouth start watering.

“This,” Aja says, stepping inside, “is Solo’s.”

The name holds reverence in her mouth. Lian watches as Aja breathes in and her shoulders drop. “Solo!” she calls out. “Coffee!”

The man behind the counter turns towards them, and Lian’s breath hitches in her throat.

He is _gorgeous_. The type of person more suited to the sleek pages of a magazine than behind a counter in a shop, but he makes it work anyway. Dark hair just starting to fall out of its slicked-back style, a jawline that could honestly cut marble, and a wide smile on his face when he sees Aja that makes Lian just want to stare for a little while.

“Hello to you too, Aja darling,” Solo says. He leans on the counter. “How am I, you ask? Oh, just fine, thanks. Waiting for my boyfriend to finish up his work for the day so I can clock out early. How are you?”

Aja pulls a face at him. “He’ll be done soon, I’m sure. And I’m fine, thanks.” She takes the post-it out of her pocket and slides it across the counter. “Twelve coffees, please. Including Illya’s and Gaby’s.”

Solo takes the post-it and glances over it. His smile softens, and he tucks it into a pocket without another word. “Right away.” He glances at Lian as he turns towards the espresso machine. “Who’s your friend?”

“Oh, yeah. Solo, this is Wen Lian, our new field agent.” Before Lian can say anything about this obvious security breach, Aja waves one hand. “Lian, this is Solo. He knows about UNCLE, for starters, so don’t worry about what I just told him. He has security clearance, you can look it up when we get back if you don’t trust me.”

Solo extends his hand. “Pleased to meet you,” he says, with a devastatingly charming smile curling his lips. “Aja roped you in to help carry the coffees?”

“It was about time she was introduced,” Aja says as Lian nods and shakes his hand. “Solo here keeps most of us functioning with his coffee, and his brownies are to die for. Feel free to come in whenever you want in the evenings after work as well. There’s usually one or two of us in here. It’s a good place to decompress if you need it.”

“There’s a back room that is mostly for you all,” Solo says, nodding at a door off to one side. “Pity that Aja made you forfeit the bet, though.”

Aja groans. “Shit, I had completely forgotten about that.” She slumps on the counter. “Dammit. Sorry, Lian. I honestly forgot about it. At least there’s the second round now.”

Lian shrugs. She has no idea what this bet is about, but she isn’t particularly bothered. She’s more distracted by the pastries she can see in the display case behind Aja.

“Not that anyone is particularly good at it,” Solo says as practiced hands produce coffee after coffee, sliding them into carriers that Aja sets up. “Though I’ll admit, the drag idea was ingenious.”

Aja and Solo chat like that for a few minutes as Solo works, occasionally including Lian. They’re obviously friends, Solo is obviously well-versed in UNCLE’s goings on. Aja ribs Solo over his adoration for this boyfriend of his that he can’t stop smiling about, and Solo asks after other agents with a note of worry in his voice until Aja allays any concerns.

The coffees are finally made, and Lian takes some of the carriers. “The regulars are labelled as usual, the rest are black,” Solo says as he takes the notes that Aja hands him. “I’ll see you later, Aja. Nice to meet you, Wen Lian.” He slides something over the counter to her, wrapped up in a napkin. “I saw you looking,” he says with a wink. “It’s on the house.”

Lian unwraps the napkin to see a croissant. “Thank you,” she gets out, and then Aja is waving goodbye and ushering her out of the door, and the cold air of London hits her as the door swings shut behind them.

“There are three rules to UNCLE,” Aja says as they head back across the street, coffees in hand. “Well, there are a lot, but these are the ones that aren’t in the briefings, but that you need to know anyway.”

Lian pays attention.

“One, Waverly knows. Whatever secret you think you can keep from him, whatever little thing you think isn’t worth his time, he already knows. Two, you might think that out of Illya Kuryakin and Gaby Teller, out of all the stories you must have heard of them, that Illya is the one you need to be careful of. You would be wrong. And three: Solo’s is ours. Disrupt it, and you will forfeit your place here. Harm him in any way, and there's no point even trying to run.”

Lian just nods. When they get upstairs, the coffees get passed around and she sits back down at her desk, the rest of the office keeps moving on around her like normal, or whatever passes for normal in this building. She sips at her own coffee as an afterthought, then pauses, and takes another drink.

The coffee is really good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everyone is referring to Wen Lian as Lian, and not Wen, because she is Chinese and so her surname comes first and then her first name. From what I understand, if she was in China/speaking Mandarin she wouldn't just be called Lian and it would be different depending on who was addressing her, etc, but she has anglicised it a little to make her life easier, which is her choice and based off various real-life friends and how they use their names in the UK.
> 
> Illya really was a couple seconds away from giving Gibson a black eye, at the very least. He has absolutely no room for incompetence. It's practically a rite of passage now for new people to be introduced to Napoleon and for them to stare in awe at him, Napoleon finds it flattering because at heart he is a vain man, Gaby finds it utterly hilarious, and Illya pretends to be annoyed about it but internally is pretty pleased that everyone finds Napoleon gorgeous, but _he_ is the one who's dating him. And yes, Illya makes other agents take little post-its down to Napoleon with cute messages on them, and yes, Napoleon keeps every single one of them.
> 
> As always, kudos and comments are much loved! Again, sorry for the wait!


End file.
